おほかたに秋の寝覚めの露けくは
また誰が袖に有明の月
また誰が袖に有明の月
- Roma-ji
-
Ōkata ni aki no nezame no tsuyukeku wa mata taga sode ni ariake no tsuki
- English Translation
-
If it is common
to wake in autumn and find
the dew upon one
then on whose sleeve besides mine
is the moon that stays past dawn
- Meaning
- If waking in autumn leaves everyone's sleeve wet, then on whose sleeve but mine does the dawn moon lodge?
- Commentary
-
Book Four Autumn Poems I 435
Headnote: composed on the theme of the moon at daybreak, for a contest at the residence of Tsunefusa.
The topic is the moon of daybreak, and the poem was submitted to a contest at that house.
Nijoin no Sanuki was a daughter of Minamoto no Yorimasa and served Emperor Nijo; she was later active in Go-Toba's circle. In Book Two she is the poet of the hundred and thirtieth poem and in Book Three of the two hundred and thirty-seventh and seventy-first. Yorimasa, poet of the three hundred and twenty-ninth and eighty-seventh, was her father.
The time is daybreak in autumn; no place is given.
The occasion was submission to the contest.
The first line means in the common way, as a general thing, and sets up what follows as true of everyone.
The word in the second line means waking in the night, used in the three hundred and ninety-fifth and ninety-eighth poems of this book.
The adjective in the third line means wet with dew, and also inclined to tears, used in Jien's ninety-fifth poem in Book Two; the particle marks a supposition.
The fourth line means: on whose sleeve besides. If everyone's sleeve is wet, the moon has no particular reason to lodge on hers.
The poem closes on a noun. Sagami's four hundred and tenth poem said the moon was reflected on her sleeve and nowhere else; this one says it may lodge on anyone's, and the two make a pair.
- Author
- Nijoin no Sanuki
- Source
- Shin Kokin Wakashu
- Prev Poem
-
Sara ni mata kure o tanome to akenikeri tsuki wa tsurenaki aki no yo no sora
- Next Poem
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Haraikane sakoso wa tsuyu no shigekarame yadoru ka tsuki no sode no semaki ni